dragons
by tommy turkish
Summary: alternate storyline following the battle with the huns.. more angst, more romance.. rating may change.
1. wounded

*scenario one (in the wake of an avalanche and the fury of the Hun leader)*  
  
The sword slashed through the thick fabric of her tunic like the plow of a boat through water. Mulan felt the cold sting of harsh metal on opened flesh and she struggled not to scream. Blood flowed, she felt it leave her body and with it, warmth. The frost around her invaded her pores, but she lunged to her feet as the Hun warrior bellowed his rage and ran for her life. Shang had been running toward her, she allowed herself a brief respite to appreciate such touching protection before grabbing onto his hand and pulling him along with her to escape the quickly advancing snow.   
  
Kahn galloped up beside them and Mulan leapt onto his strong back. She flung out a hand to pull Shang onto the horse with her, but the snow lifted him off his feet and swept him away from her grasp.  
  
Mulan watched in horror as he disappeared beneath a white wave of ice. She pulled on Kahn's reins with every ounce of strength she had left in her rapidly depleting wells. One-tenth of a second passed before she realized that – outcome being what it may – she couldn't leave Shang to fend for himself. She couldn't take the chance that he might not…  
  
"Shit," she muttered under her breath. "Kahn, please, don't let me down."  
  
They plunged through the cold, clinging desert of snow, flying towards a cliff that grew more threatening by the moment. Mulan shoved the fear clinging to her heart deep down, to where she could begin to ignore it.   
  
"Pleasepleaseplease…"  
  
Yao, Chien-Po, and Ling watched with frozen expressions of terror on their faces as Ping turned his horse into the force of the avalanche and towards a fall of over a hundred feet.   
  
"We have to help him," Yao muttered, fighting off the stifling dread.  
  
He pulled a rope from around his waist, uncoiling it quickly into a long strand of thick harness. Ling, understanding his intentions, reached for a bow and arrow off his back. The stocky man looped the rope onto the arrow's shaft and pulled the bowstring taut. Apologizing under his breath, asking for some sort of redemption for what he was about to do, hoping his aim would be true, he sent the arrow soaring.  
  
"Ping!!!" he yelled, and his voice snapped like a gunshot.  
  
She looked up at the sound, forgetting for the moment her battle with the snow underfoot. The arrow sailed into her shoulder, and Mulan bit back a howl of pain. Feeling her stamina fade, she fought back the nausea, drove the fatigue into the deepest recesses of her mind, and broke the thin wood of the shaft.   
  
"Shang," she whispered, paralyzed with fear.   
  
Watching his head disappear again in the endless ocean of white, she felt a panic bubble up inside her.  
  
"Shang!!!"  
  
She tore the wood free, tied one end of the rope to her saddle and the other to a piece of flint and, praying desperately, threw.  
  
Shang heard his name on the wind. Faintly, it carried, but with desperate hope he fought the smothering snow and watched a rock sail through the air to land a foot away from his face. His eyes traced the rope attached, and alighted on Ping, struggling to keep his horse calm in the onslaught of sound and force. He fought to reach the rope, and felt relief burst as he closed his hands around it.  
  
Mulan watched him, holding her breath, as he first saw the lifeline then made for it. At the sight of his hands gripping the coiled rope, she let out a huge whoosh of thankful air. Her hands, raw now and slick with her own blood, clutched the rope and pulled him slowly to her as Kahn struggled and slipped on slick and powerful snow. She dug her heels into the horse's flanks, even as she dragged Shang closer to her and Kahn and their precarious safety.   
  
Shang pulled himself onto her horse as she grasped the reins and manuevered them towards Yao, the group, and the rock ledge that protected them from murderous ice.  
  
Finally they reached shelter, and stood panting as the snow hurtled off the eave above them into depths so narrowly missed. Mulan was exhausted, suddenly, her adrenaline having left with the anxious terror of the ordeal, and she slid off Kahn's back, limp. Shang ordered everyone back, giving her room to breath, to regain the strength she'd sacrificed so completely.   
  
"Ping!!"  
  
He noticed for the first time, the blood pouring from her shoulder and from her lower chest. Shang's breath caught painfully in his throat as he watched her try to smile, to reassure, after all she'd gone through. Tears pricked his eyes, salty hurtful, at the sacrifice made in his name.  
  
"Ping," he whispered, hoarse.   
  
He looked up at the soldiers gathered around him.  
  
"Someone call for help!!" he yelled, desperately. He turned back to his friend, the young man who had saved his life above his own and whispered. "Ping, you'll be alright. Just hang in there. Hold on…"  
  
The last thing Mulan saw before drifting into blessed darkness was his face, his mouth, telling her to hold on. 


	2. revelation

"What?"  
  
The exclamation was wrought from Shang's mouth, quiet and disbelieving. He shook his head even as the military doctor nodded his reaffirmation. The army's general pushed his way past the guards posted, into the tent that housed a young man he had believed was... just that.  
  
Mulan pushed gingerly at the drugging haze that surrounded her, trying to gain some understanding of where she was and what had happened. She remembered Shang's face, his concern before she had fainted, and smiled. His face then, was more than a memory. She was seeing it in the flesh as he strode into her tent. Her smile broadened and she sat up despite the ache near her stomach, and the throbbing at her temple, wanting to talk to him, to make sure he was okay.  
  
He had walked into the tent on an impulse borne of stunned incredulity. His face now fell, faced with such obvious evidence of the truth. Gauze bandage had been wrapped around her torso, but did nothing to hide curves that could belong to no man. She watched his face register first amazement then denial and finally anger. She followed his gaze to the gauze that adorned her breast, and cringed painfully at what she knew was the end.  
  
She opened her mouth to explain, to offer some excuse for what had to be the greatest shock imaginable, but was interrupted by the entry of the Emperor's Consul.  
  
"So, it's true!!!" the ugly little man exclaimed, perversely delighted at this turn of events.   
  
Shang, disgusted with himself for not knowing, with Mulan for being what she wasn't supposed to be, and with the old man for being such a sickening little prick, shoved the tent flap up and stormed out. The guards at the tent followed him bemusedly with their eyes.   
  
"Sir?" one ventured.  
  
Shang turned abruptly at the voice. He shook his head abruptly, and snapped out orders.  
  
"At ease, Quan. You and Lau take the others and search for any survivors. Assemble at the base of the mountain, we'll be moving out soon, and I don't want to leave anyone behind."  
  
He watched them leave, joined by seven others who had survived the avalanche. Yao, Chien-Po and Ling stayed behind. Shang didn't tell them to leave, they were closest to Ping and…. He heard the tent flap open and fought a fierce rage as he braced himself for the chaos.  
  
Mulan was rudely snatched up and out of her warm shelter into the freezing climate of a Chinese winter. Eyes stared, uncomprehending as the Consul threw her to the ground and announced her gender in ringing, revolted tone. That she should be ashamed of the fact coated every word. Her friends, men she had won the respect and trust of as Ping, looked at her now aghast. She clutched the blanket about her shoulders, appealing to Shang for understanding if not acceptance.   
  
"I did it to protect my father," she protested amidst the Consul's resonating accusations. She pleaded with Shang, her emotions unguarded and desperate on her face.  
  
"It was the only way."   
  
He didn't even look at her. And the pain of that was worse than any humiliation suffered before the soldiers.  
  
"The penalty is DEATH," came the Consul's tinny voice, and an audible gasp rose from those surrounding.  
  
Mulan watched Shang close his face off. Watched the stone assert itself in his features, and saw him remove her sword from its scabbard. With a sinking heart she realized he would prove no better. No different than the men he led. She fought the tears that threatened, and bowed her head. 


	3. mercy

He stood before her and stared. Saw her through eyes made aware now, of what she was, what exactly she was capable of and how awesome those accomplishments were. He saw her sitting at the top of the thick wooden pole, grinning defiantly at him and at his chauvinist opinion of her. Then she was snatching a canon from Yao and running towards the Hun leader, reckless and intelligent in her courage. And, finally, on her stallion, forsaking her own life to save his.   
  
And now, kneeling before him like a penitent servant, head bowed in defeat, waiting to be killed for no reason other than the fact that she was a woman. Killed by the person for whom she had risked her life, no less. He saw the hopelessness, the despair in her slumped shoulders. She crouched, curled up as though to protect the few shreds of clinging dignity she had left. It hit him, hard, to see her like that. So accepting, so submissive when she had proven herself, beyond all men, the most passionate. The soldier most abhorrent of defeat had given up.   
  
Shang tore his gaze away from her bent head and saw the sun reflect off the blade he clutched so tightly. He had done this. His verdict had killed every ounce of defiance in her lithe body. And he was sickened at the realization. The sword fell softly to the snow at his feet.   
  
"A life for a life," he intoned, "my debt is repaid."  
  
Mulan looked up at him. Shang's face revealed no more now than it had when he'd reached for the weapon. But he no longer held her sword. He turned away.  
  
"What?!" came the startled exclamation from the Consul. "But you cannot do this!!! You know the law!!!"  
  
Shang silenced him with a look that bespoke of a million twisting emotions.  
  
"I will not be responsible for her death," he told the sniveling aristocrat.  
  
"She is a WOMAN!!"  
  
"She saved my life," Shang replied, immovable. "She saved yours."  
  
The Consul shook his head vigorously.  
  
"That is of no consequence. She is a female, vile snake!! And…"  
  
Shang lost his patience.  
  
"That is ENOUGH!!"  
  
The silence in the snow-filled valley spoke volumes.  
  
"I will not kill her. No one will. That's the end of it."  
  
Yao breathed a sigh of relief at the ruling. Chien-Po thanked the powers that be, and Ling nearly fell over in his gratitude. The Consul turned an alarming shade of purple.  
  
"The Emperor..." he began.  
  
Shang interrupted, loudly.  
  
"We are five hundred miles from the Emperor and his city. Do not concern yourself, Consul; you bear no responsibility for my decisions."  
  
The general looked finally at Mulan. Still on her knees in the snow, her face betrayed weariness and a confusion concerning the events unfolding around her. He saw the blood seep from her wounds, newly opened by the Consul and his ill ministrations, and knew he could not leave her to fend for herself in the freezing cold. He looked at the small group gathered; those who had watched the makeshift trial's proceedings. Yao, Chien-Po, and Ling, he knew would cooperate to the extent of their abilities, she was their friend, or had been. The Consul, in keeping his silence, might demonstrate less willingness to oblige with Shang's decree, but there were ways to take care of even him.  
  
"Ping... Mulan... will be traveling with us."  
  
"She'll... what?!"  
  
Shang quelled this outburst from the ugly, old man with his eyes.  
  
"She is not well enough to travel alone, Consul. Thanks to your careful handling of her, wounds that had only begun to heal are now opened and bleeding. I won't leave her to die, so she comes with us."  
  
He paused.  
  
"I will have your silence. Today's... discoveries will not leave this assemblage. Yao, Chien-Po, Ling, I would have your oaths that nothing you have seen will be repeated."  
  
All three nodded their consent.  
  
"And, you, Consul, if you value your position of esteem among this company, will do the same. Being bound and gagged is not, I trust, a pleasant experience."  
  
The Consul's eyes widened at this poorly veiled threat, but he uttered no contradiction. Indeed his position among the Emperor's courtiers meant little so far from the city's walls.  
  
"Yao, help her back into the tent. Where's the doctor?"  
  
Mulan pushed herself to her feet before Yao could help. Woman she might be, but she refused to rely on someone for assitance. Her hair fell into her eyes and helped hide the painful grimace that lined her face. Yao offered his hand, but she ignored it, walking past with head-lifting dignity. The blanket slipped down her shoulders and hastily she pulled it up around her neck. She stumbled, losing footing in the yielding snow and struggled to regain her balance.   
  
Sympathy blossomed unexpectedly in Shang and he deliberately stifled it. But not before taking an involuntary step in her direction. Yao was at her side first, though, and held onto her elbow as she gingerly staggered into the tent.  
  
"Ping..."  
  
Mulan smiled bitterly as she eased herself back onto the bedding.  
  
"Sorry," Yao muttered. "Mulan. Are you... are you going to be okay?"  
  
She looked up, stunned.  
  
"Yeah... thanks Yao. I'll be fine."  
  
He smiled, unsure of himself, and left the tent.  
  
Mulan watched him go and, at the sudden ache in her heart, she finally gave in to her tears. 


	4. new

The doctor reemerged an hour later, having sewn up her wounds and applied bandages. He informed Shang of Mulan's condition and retreated to his own tent to rest until morning. The entire company was camped out for the night, and Shang's feelings alternated between rage at this delay in the cold and snow because of a scrawny little girl that didn't know enough to just stay at home, and guilt that she was in that tent, suffering because of what she had done to save him and his men.   
  
He looked around for guidance, saw the hunched old man walking to his tent, clutching his medical bag in gnarled fingers that had sewn up Mulan's wounds. He'd wondered at that. She hadn't screamed, or even whimpered at what could only be extremely painful primitive surgery. Shang had listened for it, worried despite his resolve not to be, and had heard nothing. And it only served to peak his growing interest in this girl who had risked her life to save her father's and pose as a man. Cursing under his breath, he walked into her tent.  
  
She was lying on the ground, covered in blankets. Her chest rose and fell with each soft breath and her eyelashes were spread across her pale cheeks like silk fans. Her hair, that until now had been bound, caressed her skin, framing her face in ebony wisps of down. For once, her face was actually clean, and it struck Shang that the only reason she had kept it so filthy was to hide features so delicate, so incredibly feminine that any man would be hard pressed not to fall for her. Even a man so callous... so disciplined. Oh god. He felt himself being drawn in by the serenity she offered. Lying there she exuded the tranquility and contentment of a child. He found himself starving for that peace, wondering if somehow she could teach him. To trust. And it scared the shit out of him.   
  
Shang ran his hands over his face, trying to rub away the feel of paradise that lingered. Up until a few hours ago, she had been nothing to him but a soldier in his corps. And a dirty one at that. But she'd had guts. From the beginning she had intrigued him, and won his respect. Eventually his trust.  
  
Except now she wasn't a man.   
  
Mulan fought off the last vestiges of her unconsciousness and forced her eyes open. They felt gritty, and unused, as though she was opening them for the first time. The space surrounding her was dark, and she felt a moment's panic before realizing that night had fallen. She moved her arm cautiously and gasped at the pain that shot from her shoulder down to the tips of her fingers. Something moved near the tent opening and she pushed herself up on her elbows to see what it was. The pain was incredible. Mulan groaned softly and let herself fall back onto her rough pillow, the agony making stars burst before her eyes and her head pound like a million drum beats.   
  
Shang saw her collapse and scrambled to kneel in the snow, gazing down at her intently.   
  
"Ping...?"  
  
He lay a hand on her brow.  
  
"... Mulan?"  
  
She opened her eyes slowly. His face loomed, worried, above her. His lips were inches from hers. She shook herself mentally. He knew her secret now, but that didn't make it anymore appropriate to fling herself at him. No matter how many times she'd wanted to.  
  
"Shang," she whispered. Her lips were drier than dust, but she smiled.  
  
He didn't return the gesture.   
  
"Are you hurt?" he demanded, more roughly than he'd intended.  
  
She shook her head.  
  
"I'm fine."  
  
Her voice cracked like the snow underfoot. He got up to get her some water.   
  
"Here, drink this."  
  
She took it from him gratefully. The water slid down her throat like gossamer bits of ice. Shang watched her drink, entranced by the graceful tilt of her chin, the satiny skin at her neck. She finished, putting the cup down at her side, and Shang was cruelly disappointed at his lack of indifference. He shoved himself to his feet.  
  
"We'll be moving out tomorrow. The men are cold, weary. We need to find shelter. Food. We can't put it off any longer, you'll just have to keep up. Get some sleep."  
  
Mulan cringed at his thinly masked scorn. He had saved her from death, but was nowhere near forgiving her for her lies. She pulled the covers tight around her, and tried to ignore the pain in her torso and arm. His cold words ran around in her mind countless times, their humming redundancy finally lulling her to sleep. 


	5. complications

They had been travelling for almost two days. Mulan was tired, and she ached, but she made no protest, no complaint. The men had ridden around her for the first part of the journey, congratulating her on her triumph, and thanking her for her bravery. She had withstood their cheer and goodwill as long as she was able. But it soon began to chafe against her weary spirit. Her recent exposure brought home the desolate fact that while they respected and admired her as a man, they would condemn her without remorse for being a woman. So she became withdrawn, quiet, and they eventually returned to their march, leaving her to travel in relative peace.  
  
Shang noticed her paleness, the almost translucent quality to her skin. Yao watched the concern coat his general's face, wondered at the man's interest in Ping. Or Mulan. Yao turned his gaze then to the girl sitting atop the huge horse, seeing the features that set her apart from the rest of them. He shrugged. He didn't see it. She was too skinny, too plain. He appreciated her courage and mind, really. The fact that she was a woman served only to compound that fact. He envied her, yes: he had even when he'd thought she was Ping, but it wasn't a raging emotion. He could, after all, do things she never could, so it all balanced out. He grinned gruffly. New experience, this, comparing himself to a woman.   
  
Shang struggled to quell his battling emotions. He wanted to ask her if she was okay, to make sure her wounds were healing, give her something that might ease the pain. But at the same time, he adamantly refused to give Mulan any indication of the strange compassion he felt.   
  
Ling saw the expressions flicker across Shang's face. Saw the scowl, and the uncertainty, and against every inch of the man's better judgement, there was concern. Ling hid a smile. Poor Shang.  
  
Night fell and this time the company stopped to set up camp. Mulan nearly fell off her horse in utter exhaustion and stumbled to where she was supposed to set up her tent.  
  
"Here, Ping, let me do it."  
  
She looked up into Chien-Po's face. His eyes were kind and gentle. It was so nice to have someone not pass judgement. Nice to see something other than the stern, unforgiving glare so familiar to Shang. She didn't want to have to rely on someone else for help, though. Mulan was desperate to not give Shang any more reason to hate her.  
  
"No, Chien-Po..." she began to protest weakly.  
  
He ignored her objections and picked up her things. The tent was up in less than five minutes and Chien-Po patted her on the back before moving away to set up his own. Mulan began dragging her bedding off Kahn's back and lugging it into her newly erected house. Shang walked by as she was coming out, and she tossed him a hesitant smile. He didn't return it, continuing, instead, as though she didn't exist.  
  
Mulan tried not to care, she told herself that she didn't need him to like her, that he had kept her from getting killed and, really, she didn't want anything else from the bastard. But she didn't believe herself. And it hurt.   
  
She lay awake in her bed that night for a long time. Thinking. She thought about her family, back in the village, probably worried sick about the daughter so absurdly abnormal as to dress up as a man and join the army. Thought of her father, and what might have happened to him if she hadn't gone slightly mad that night. She saw him then, moving with a quiet dignity across the plains of her mind, and she brushed back sudden tears. She missed him so much. What would she say to him when she got home? Would he want her still? Or would he see her actions as a betrayal of the highest magnitude, and turn her away? Her breath caught in her throat and fear washed over her in ice cold waves.  
  
Mulan closed her eyes against the sudden onslaught, hating the trembling in her stomach. She pushed herself out of bed and into the night, hoping a saunter under the moon might help ease her apprehensions.   
  
Her footsteps fell softly outside the tents of sleeping soldiers. Shang watched, strangely enthralled as her lithe form swept across fields of grass in the dark. He sat, quietly contemplating in the embrace of a huge willow. He, like her, had his own demons to contend with, and left Mulan to her own devices, biting back the instinct to bark at her and have her return to her tent. Shang watched her, though, and found himself contemplating things that had very little to do with bad memories and everything to do with the slim, shadowy silhouette roaming the meadow and suddenly his mind. 


	6. night

The next morning was cold and offensively refreshing. Mulan woke up groggy, and still half-asleep. The sounds of men and horses moving out pulled her out of bed when she would have stayed longer. Quickly wrapping things up and stumbling out of her tent, she began packing things hurriedly on Kahn's back. She was aware, suddenly, of a growing silence. Looking up from the short hair on her horse's flanks, Mulan felt her cheeks turn red at the quiet attention she was receiving. Shang sat on his horse, looking down at her with a sneer on his face that exuded disgust.  
  
"Do you suppose it would be alright if the company started out, soldier?"  
  
It was a fierce battle to not flinch in the face of such calculated loathing.   
  
"I do realize your sleep is very important to you, but it would be nice if you didn't cost us two hours every time we stopped somewhere."  
  
She avoided his eyes. The emotions swirling around in them were too raw. And the tears threatening hers were not something she wanted him to see.  
  
"The men and I have places to be. If it's not too much trouble."  
  
Mulan looked up at the almost imperceptible stress he put on the word 'men'. She wasn't sure she hadn't imagined it.  
  
"Someone help the boy with his horse."  
  
With that final, veiled cut, Shang dug his heels into his horse's sides and turned away. Mulan's face burned with a shame and a fury unparalleled. Her eyes shot sparks at every man who made the mistake of turning a foot towards her and her horse.  
  
Ten minutes later, after much fumbling and cursing on her part, she leapt up onto Kahn's back and waited, seething, for Shang to lead his army out. She burned in her indignance and let the rage course through her in angry, hot waves. No one went near her for the entire journey and she saw so much red, it wouldn't have mattered anyway.  
  
Finally, Shang called them to a halt. The sun was setting across the fields of rice, and the bright pink that adorned the skies told him it was time to stop. For the fiftieth time that day he viciously quelled the guilt that ruptured his soul. Every time he thought of what had happened, he felt like throwing up. And his head pounded like fuckingall.  
  
"This spot is fine. We'll camp here for the night."  
  
He watched Mulan almost fall of Kahn, watched her set up her tent and stumble into it. He worried despite every inner protest. Felt like so much shit. Shang shook his head to clear the clinging guilt and disappeared into his tent. It would do no good thinking about it.. about her. He knew that. The problem lay in how exactly he was going to stop. As he floated into clouds of sleep, the last thing Shang saw was her face.  
  
A day passed, and two. A week almost, before Shang met Mulan walking the abandoned rice fields at midnight.   
  
She looked up, startled at the quiet footfall. Mulan saw Shang's silhouette shadowy against the eerie black-white of the night sky and sighed. He was so harsh, so incapable of forgiveness, of simple human compassion. And yet, she remembered warmth in that gaze, laughter line that face. Mulan drew a trembling hand across her eyes; self-pity was for the weak. She hadn't left her home and joined the army to meet anyone's expectations but her own. Risking her life had everything to do with saving her father's and nothing, whatsoever, to do with the approval of a man who until only a few months ago had been a complete stranger. For the five hundred and tenth time, Mulan told herself that it really shouldn't matter how he felt. And for the five hundred and tenth time, she was forced to concede that it did.  
  
Shang saw her stop, look up at him and turn away. She had seen him and he exhaled softly his frustration. The fates had been unkind. Sending him this woman as a man, sending with her the death of his father, this loss of his soul. God, his feelings rumbled around inside him like so many dragons clamouring to be unleashed. He felt doomed...that if he let one of them out, they would all escape, frantic and horrible in their intensity, and with such fire, leave him hollow and empty in their wake.  
  
He thought of his father. And he cried. 


	7. room

The next day the sun rose quiet and triumphant, painting everything brilliant and wonderful, mocking harshly, Shang's mood. He scowled at singing birds, wincing as the notes seemed to collide with the most tender parts of his head. He hadn't slept well for nights and it had begun to tell.  
  
Passing through the latest settlement, the troops were forced to restrain their loud revelry and pay respects to the memories of soldiers recently passed. The town had learnt that day who from their own were among the victims of the Huns and mourned accordingly. Mulan fought the cement suddenly blocking her throat and turned stinging eyes away from new and inexperienced widows and orphans they passed in the streets.  
  
The troop, having finally found an inn capable of housing them all, dismounted and began gathering their things. Mulan did the same, her mind not really on any tasks at hand, but with her father and mother, still alive and together. Right then, for what she new would be a fleeting moment, she had absolutely no regrets about the choice she'd made. Because of it, her father's life was spared, and her mother was not among those who mourned. Unless of course, she mourned the betrayal, the utter failure of her daughter. Mulan felt her face turn ashen at the thought. There was so much she was answerable for. Her moment had definitely been short-lived. And when the feeling got so bad she wondered what could possibly be worse, Shang chose that exact moment to settle himself comfortably within her line of vision.   
  
He seemed preoccupied as he discussed the sleeping arrangements with his men and the innkeeper. Mulan wondered what exactly the problem could be. She watched the soldiers breaking off into pairs. The inn was obviously big, but hardly big enough to accommodate one soldier to a room. It hit her then. He didn't know where to put her.  
  
A smirk slid across her lips. Where to house the lone girl soldier? Such strange and troubling issues with which to occupy a general's mind. Mulan nearly laughed at the incredulity that joined consternation in Shang's face. But remorse followed quickly after, at her own responsibility for his dilemma. He had other things on his mind, she knew. Things he'd do better to actually acknowledge. She had yet to see him grieve for his father and could not understand how he bore it. Mulan watched him more minutes and then left her horse to explain that it really wouldn't be a problem where she slept as she intended to do that and only that. Changing out of her clothes wasn't even really an option, she was so exhausted.  
  
"Shang..." she began.  
  
The look he sent her way left the words hanging off her lips unsaid. At the end of it all, the Consul was going to board with Yao for the night, to the mumbled and obvious discontent of both, Chien-Po and Ling had been paired up, and she was being led upstairs by a young woman to the room she was meant to spend the night in. Not alone, quite the opposite actually, she was sharing with Shang. Apparently, and to no one's surprise, the Consul was "certainly NOT going to reside in such close proximity with a female, no matter how long." Further, the doctor had to inspect her wounds, she would need to have them cleaned and re-bandaged and well, Shang was not exactly willing to take the chance that anyone else might learn what the few of them had. They agreed that the place least likely for that to happen would be the General's room. Not many men were likely to approach it, let alone walk in unannounced.  
  
Mulan couldn't really argue against the logic. Still, she resented the way her fate – or sleeping arrangements at least – were in the hands of these few men who treated it much like they would a battle plan. She felt less a person and more an unwanted pet. It stung. When offered a room, though, any room, she took it. And fell gratefully onto the waiting mattress.  
  
Another hour later, Shang walked in, bathtub in tow. He had the innkeeper set everything up and then leave, just what he intended to do. Except the girl was asleep.   
  
Shang walked over to where she lay on her bed. He stared at her, at the way her face fell into such peace when she slept. The ghosts that haunted her waking hours, that flitted across her face at different intervals during the day, seemed strangely to leave her alone in her sleep. It bothered him that he noticed the difference, that despite everything he still watched her enough to know. It bothered him too the way his fingers crept up to draw soft lines against the contours of her face. It bothered him that he wanted to feel his lips on hers, that he could actually feel himself bending, drawn to her.  
  
"Mulan."  
  
He said it loudly, sharp. To snap himself out of whatever he'd fallen into as much as to wake her up. It did both.  
  
"There's a bath," he stated simply. "I'll wait outside the door. Knock when you're done and I'll send the doctor up."  
  
She rubbed the confusion out of her eyes, nearly gasping at the fact that there was warm water two feet away from where she sat. She got up as he walked out of the room, not looking back.  
  
"I'm glad you're healing," Shang told her as the doctor left, following his inspection, and he re-entered the room.  
  
Mulan nearly fell over at the words. They were almost kind.  
  
"Maybe now that that's all done," he said, walking over to the bath, "the rest of us can allow ourselves the liberty of enjoying such luxuries as first go to the invalid, women and children."  
  
Something in her recoiled and then bit back. She was so goddamn tired of being sorry. Of feeling guilty, accepting this scorn.   
  
"You make it sound like the three are one."  
  
"In your case, aren't they?"  
  
"No."  
  
"You're wounded. You're a woman, contrary to popular opinion. And ... how old ARE you, Mulan?"  
  
"Eighteen."  
  
"Three for three, 'soldier'."  
  
"I suppose you're a jaded, old veteran," she snapped. "And the fact that I'm wounded is my own fault, of course, not the result of trying to save your life."  
  
"You think, I suppose, that your being a woman gives you the right to show such disrespect?" Shang said, quietly. Angry. "I am still your superior."  
  
"You're only my superior if you acknowledge me as a soldier," she spit back. "And we both know that's hardly the case."  
  
He wouldn't look at her, let alone answer.  
  
"So spare me the bullshit. I'm swimming in it as it is."  
  
His eyes flew up to meet hers.  
  
"I've got a fucking WOMAN in my barracks, don't tell ME about bullshit."  
  
She looked at him, calm black eyes staring up from between wisps of black hair. Quiet, she stood in the face of his anger. Then quietly she spoke.   
  
"Bullshit indeed, the general of one of China's "great armies" owing his life to a "fucking woman". It MUST be a harsh burden to bear."  
  
Shang's surprise slid almost imperceptible into his eyes.  
  
"I owe you nothing," he told her, quiet now too. "I spared you. My debt is repaid."  
  
"Your debt is far from repaid, General. I risked my life for yours. And that act was marked by my sweat, my blood. What have you done?"  
  
There was nothing in his eyes to tell of the doubt in his heart. He would keep the contents of that place secret though it cost him his life.  
  
Mulan sneered softly, almost apologetic. Sad.  
  
"You made an executive decision."  
  
She got into bed and curled to face the wall. It wasn't until long after she fell asleep that Shang even began to try. 


	8. missing

The next day Shang woke up to the sun shining almost ferociously through his window. He forced himself to push the covers back and pulled his legs over the side of the bed so he could sit up.   
  
He just breathed for a while, letting the nightmares roll off him, into the air just above his bed where he knew they would float until he couldn't fend sleep off any longer.   
  
He finally let himself look across the room and his world tilted a little when he realized Mulan's bed was empty.   
  
He was on his feet and half-dressed before he thought about it. So then he tried to. He made himself sit down on his own bed and took the same slow breaths he had only minutes before.  
  
She couldn't have run away. She wouldn't have. First, why? Because of something he'd said last night? He highly doubted she valued his opinion so much. She'd made the exact opposite pretty clear, actually. And, second, where would she go?   
  
Because she was rational enough to have thought of that before just leaving? Because consequence.. the next step.. was exactly what she was thinking about when she up and joined the army in her father's armor?  
  
Shang pulled on his shirt and went to look for her.  
  
Downstairs in the tavern that served now as a makeshift dining hall, Shang scanned the men wolfing down their breakfasts. He couldn't see her. His eyes lighted on the men he knew to be her friends. She wasn't with them. He walked over anyway.  
  
"General." The three stood up, throwing out the hasty greeting around the food in their mouths.  
  
"Yao, Ling, Chien Po, " he murmured, motioning for them to sit.   
  
"How is...," Yao began, and remembering, lowered his voice. "How is she?"  
  
Shang let the implications of that questions settle, hiding his concern for her as he answered.  
  
"She's well. Better."  
  
The three nodded, relief softly lining war-weary features.   
  
"She's resting now, then?" Ling asked, apprehensive of the general's reply. Mulan was not, generally speaking, a safe topic. But in this his concern overruled.  
  
Shang looked at him, lost a little.  
  
"Right, yes.. resting."  
  
"Perhaps I should save her something to eat," Chien-Po suggested quietly. "For later ... to keep up her strength."  
  
It was an idea with merit. That she would need to eat something eventually. Of course, she had to turn up first. And Shang increasingly worried that he had effectually sent her home with his harsh words last night.   
  
"It's.. it's okay Chien-Po. I'll have them make her something when she's ready for it."  
  
He couldn't help scanning the room again. She wasn't there. This could take a while.  
  
"Yao," he began, forcing his gaze back to the man in front of him, "act as my second-in-command today. Chien-Po and Ling will help you take the men through their drills."  
  
"Yes sir," the three murmured, not a little bemused.   
  
Satisfied, he nodded, and abruptly left the tavern, heading for the stables. 


	9. snow

characters aren't mine. story is. sorry it's taken so long. i think i might be back on track.  
  
~  
  
Playing. Her hair falling out of the tight tail she kept it in, framing a face too delicate to be a soldier's. A face flushed and glowing and pink with the cold and laughter. So soft and female that he stood, just watching, wondering how the children chasing her around didn't themselves wonder at the absolute woman running around in men's clothes. Suspect somehow. But then he hadn't. 20/20 hindsight right. Amazed, only now, at not noticing the sweep of her eyebrows, the curve of her mouth, the strength, obstinance and vulnerable yearning mixing in her eyes. Her eyes. Clouded now and troubled, her frame weighted and still where it had just minutes before moved supple, lithe, light. Because she'd seen him.  
  
"I've been looking everywhere for you," the anger inexplicably weaving its way into his voice.  
  
Anger at her happiness, at the way she, after everything, can play with children and not have it feel wrong, unnatural. Angry at the feelings warring in his chest, the thoughts chasing each other around in his head, the way nothing sits right since he's seen her. Angry that he can do that to those eyes.  
  
And he felt his mouth moving, lips parting again almost irrevocable, and anticipated the sarcastic scorn spilling over, hated himself for it, but needed to say it anyway.  
  
Except then something slammed into his chest, white, cold, exploding and his tirade abruptly ended. Shang looked down, disbelief in stark relief against his beautiful face.  
  
And watched another snowball burst just below the first one.  
  
He looked up then, anger and incredulous hilarity battling behind his eyes. Mulan stood frozen, both hands snow-filled, waiting for him to react. Trying to swallow the hysterical, gut-wrenching laughter that bubbled in her throat. Giving in, ridiculously happy, as a snowball erupted against her arm.  
  
They fought for hours, Shang laughing and light, Mulan finding the familiar, settled weight on her heart strangely absent. Covered in snow, they finally collapsed into it. The kids swept angel shapes into the white and Mulan and Shang helped with snowpeople, smoothing out rough edges, etching in corners or mouths and wings.  
  
"What are you working on?"  
  
Mulan knelt by the little boy studiously manipulating his own elusive snow creation. He looked up at her for half a second before focusing once more on the task at hand. Carving in scales with his mittened hands it was a while before he answered, concentrating on getting it perfect. She was content to watch. And to wait.  
  
"It's a guardian. A dragon for my baba. To keep him company and keep him safe because my mama says he's with the ancestors now, but I don't know if he knows any of them. Or if they're nice."  
  
Understanding dawned and the light forgetfulness of the morning slid away under Mulan's feet. She saw Shang's sudden stop, heard a little girl's whine at him to keep going, felt him try. Shifting she helped her small friend finish his tribute, kissed him softly on the crown of his ebony head and sent them all home.  
  
"Shang..."  
  
"You shouldn't have been here. Don't you realize how dangerous this is? If any of the villagers suspected..."  
  
She looked away. Watched the children run back to their houses hair, laughter trailing behind them in the wind. Brushed the snow off her pants and waited for them to disappear before she quietly turned back to him.  
  
"Actually, after my close call with decapitation I think I'm pretty aware of the dangers of the situation."  
  
It was all back. He'd felt it leave him, let it leave him. But it was back, and his mouth lifted, inevitable, into a sneer. He laughed, an ugly sound wrenched from his throat and flung at her.   
  
"I'm sorry, what is that? A sob story from the girl who wanted to be a man?"  
  
Her eyes suddenly burned rage and something that looked a lot like hatred.   
  
"This has never been about that. YOU'RE a man, Shang. There is nothing in you to recommend the sex."  
  
Mulan watched his jaw clench. She saw anger in his eyes, but would not flinch, because really, fuck it.  
  
"WHY then?" he yelled, suddenly. "Why do this?"  
  
"To save my father's LIFE. To stop him from having to sacrifice himself so needlessly! He was an old man, Shang. He could not... he couldn't have survived. God, he couldn't even walk..."  
  
"Did he ASK you to do this for him? Would he have accepted his daughter's life in place of his own?"  
  
"Would any man ASK for the help he so desperately needed??!! Would YOU? As though to admit to feelings is some great crime. Sacrilege. Or dishonour!!"  
  
"You had no RIGHT..."  
  
"I had EVERY RIGHT!! It's MY LIFE!!"  
  
"That's right. Your life. Only yours, you're accountable to NO ONE. Because you have no father, no mother worried out of her MIND because a daughter taken with madness decides to up and join the army one night."  
  
Mulan stared at him, hating the words he threw at her, hating the images he invoked, the secret fears. Her eyes shone with tears and a fierce rejection.  
  
"And did you do it for your father, Mulan? Is that really why you came here, why you've made such a spectacle of yourself? For your father, I suppose. For the honour of the Fa family. It had nothing at all to do with your proving yourself to the world, with the fact that Fa Mulan is a great woman, above all things domestic, far better than the hearth and home..."  
  
"Stop it."  
  
The words came out whispered, fearful. Shang found he couldn't do anything but stop at the pain they so thinly cloaked.  
  
"I did what I thought was RIGHT. I didn't want to lose him. And, yes ... I was mad at him. ANGRY, because we meant so little held up against his PRIDE, his honour. My mother wept at night for him, and it meant NOTHING. He would still go. Well, I stopped it. I made it so that he couldn't.  
  
"And if I've proved myself along the way, if maybe I was hoping I could do that all along, then FINE. So WHAT? I've waited long enough for the chance."  
  
Mulan fought desperately the tears that pushed at her lashes. Shang fought desperately both the urge to envelope her in his arms and drink her sadness and a need to hurt her, to drive her away. His eyes always unreadable, he watched her continue.  
  
"You don't think I TRIED before?" she breathed. "All that hearth and home bullshit, I've TRIED. I WENT to the goddamn matchmaker, subjected myself to the scrutiny of a harsh, ugly and unkind woman, to the humility of her inevitable rejection. How many times do I need to hear I'm worthless before I start believing it? I HAD to do this. I had to."  
  
Shang stared. At the drops that coursed down her face. She wouldn't look away. She brushed the hair out of her face, her eyes challenged him.  
  
"And I cannot apologize any more."  
  
Her eyes left his as she reached for Kahn's neck and pulled herself onto his back. Shang stood in silence, lost and inept in the emotions that rolled across the landscape and along the ground where she had just a moment ago stood.   
  
"Mu-.."  
  
The name was almost past his lips before he even realized what he was saying. He tried to yell 'Ping' after her, but found somehow he couldn't. And by the time he got to his own horse, she was gone. 


End file.
